(A customer calls in, noticing that she hasn’t had any money taken from her account for her water heater rental for the last couple months.)

Me: “Okay, so let me look into your file. Hmm, seems you’ve not been set up on our new billing system. That’s probably the problem. Let me just grab your info from the old system to fix it. Wait, you’re not in there either.”

Customer: “Huh?”

Me: “I don’t think you’ve been billed for this in a while. Yeah, here’s a note from 2007 saying you hadn’t been billed since September ’06. It seems as though they just closed it without actually fixing it. You haven’t been charged for seven years.”

Customer: “Wow.”

Me: “Now, unfortunately, we’re going to have to back-bill you for this—”

Customer: “Oh, God!”

Me: “…but luckily for you, we cap back-bills at one year. So, it won’t be a couple grand: it’ll just be about $300.”

Customer: “Oh, wow, that’s so much better. Thank you!”

Me: “Wait, did you just thank me for billing you $300?”

Customer: “Yeah. It’s like one time when I was 14, and I’d just gotten my first piercing. I told my parents that I was pregnant, and by the time they figured out that I wasn’t, they were okay with any other news I could possibly have given them.”